


all the living are dead (the war is over)

by hidefromeveryone



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Agoraphobia, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anger Management, Anxiety Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder, Depression, Dissociation, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Everyone Needs A Hug, Families of Choice, Female Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, Flashbacks, Gen, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Panic Attacks, Personal Growth, Physical Disability, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Post-War, Recovery, Self-Harm, Smoking, Suicidal Thoughts, Survivor Guilt, Trans Female Character
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-19 12:22:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13704375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hidefromeveryone/pseuds/hidefromeveryone
Summary: What's a soldier supposed to do after their war has ended?Attempt to fill the holes in their chest as they discover the meaning of home again.





	all the living are dead (the war is over)

**Author's Note:**

> i'm back, in a way. sorry for the long departure. things have been. rough, to say the least. my mental health is shit, dysphoria makes life hell, and my physical health is going downhill but i'm not dead, so. there's that. 
> 
> anyways, i return with what (i hope) will be a long journey together. look in the end notes for links to the blogs and playlists that i've made for each paladin. the blogs are (mainly) made for the purpose of you (the readers!) being able to send in questions that the characters themselves will answer. 
> 
> thanks for dealing with me over the years.

After five years, it was over. 

The bulk of it, anyway. The part they were needed for. 

Which is why, after fighting in a war they had never asked to be a part of, the five paladins were going home. Even though they weren’t quite sure if Earth qualified as their home any longer. The blue glow of the castle’s hallways, the constant purr of the lions in their minds, the small tremors and vibrations that were carried to them through the metal floors - that was as much their home as their planet had ever been. Considering the fact that they couldn’t remember the sound of the ocean or the sight of lighting any longer, it might even be considered right to view the ship as more inviting than their return home. 

Allura had delivered the news to the team earlier that morning, when they had been gathered in the kitchen after breakfast. She had said it with an air of hesitation in her voice, as if she wasn’t sure if this was what the paladins wanted anymore. It had been all they had talked about, shared stories of, longed for throughout the long nights, amputations, and breakdowns but the lack of a positive response on their faces lead her to believe otherwise. After a few seconds, a smile had danced across Lance’s featured before his countenance had settled back into one of indifference. Keith’s eyes held an air of panic that he still hadn’t perfected the concealment of after all of these years, and Hunk. Pidge, and Shiro all just nodded before settling back into their thoughts. 

None of them knew what to expect when they arrived. If their families were alive. If they had been pronounced dead, just as Shiro had been after the Kerberos mission. If they would be regarded as heroes or criminals. If they would be allowed to return to life or if they would be held in prison for the rest of their lives. 

When they reached the outskirts of Earth’s atmosphere, Allura pulled each of them in for a group hug before handing each of them a sealed letter with the instructions to open them when things became too much for them to bear. Even though each of them wanted to deny it, they all knew in the back of their minds that a day would arrive when they all would want to throw in the towel. She would have come with them if not for the fact that the government would have contained her as an experiment in their futile attempts to gain an understanding of alien life. There were rumors of a surviving Altean colony in a far-away corner of the universe that Allura would head towards after dropping them off, in an attempt to begin rebuilding what was left of her country. 

So each of the five paladins climbed into an escape pod, checking their small bags to ensure their collected belongings were all accounted for. They waited for the doors to close before closing their eyes, feeling their stomachs rise into their throats as they plummeted towards the Earth beneath them. It wasn’t long before they were staring towards the stars, watching the Castle of Lions disappear for the last time. Minutes later, they were landing outside the Garrison in the same field Shiro had been rescued from so long ago. They barely had time to exit their metal confines before guns were pointed towards their heads and shackles were looped over their wrists. It wouldn’t be until the following day that their reactions hit them. 

They knew how to shove the panic, the fear deep inside of them. So far away from their conscious minds that they couldn’t activate their terror. It was a skill they all had to learn early on, because when a soldier is captured the last thing they need to do is panic. The first thing they need to do is cut all of their emotions out of their chest so that their brain can focus on the task at hand: cataloguing information of their surroundings, their captors, the tools available to them. Escaping was the goal, and their health could be discarded in the moment in favor of surviving. It wouldn’t be until later that they remembered that not all wounds disappear once they heal on the surface. 

The Garrison had held them for nine days, interrogating each of them with a rigorous round of questioning that left each of them fractured in a different way. Keith had found Shiro dissociated in the corner of his cell, eyes unfocused as he dully responded to Keith’s inquiries of his well-being. Keith’s knuckles were split and stained with blood, leaving a smell of iron and rust in the air as he chewed through the stitches in his lip absentmindedly. Hunk’s legs could barely support his weight as he stumbled down the hallway of their makeshift jail to pick up Lance as his shaking limbs threatened to vibrate him out of existence. Lance couldn’t meet Hunk’s eyes when he arrived, his thighs covered in his own blood. The fork they had given him the day before to eat his poorly cooked meal with was sticking out of his flesh, rammed in place after going on a rampage that left dozens of holes behind. Pidge had followed them towards the front door with the greatest composure of them all until she had to step outside and her throat collapsed. She collapsed to her knees and sobbed into the dirt until Shiro picked her up, and the tunnels her nails had carved into the dirt were the only thing they left behind. 

Officially, they were dead. 

Shiro had been for a long time, declared to the public as killed in action on the Kerberos mission six years ago. Lance, Hunk, and Pidge were all written off as dead five years ago, with a training exercise reported as the cause of their untimely demise. Keith, well - Keith had no living friends or family the Garrison had to worry about reporting to. He had disappeared from the public eye when he was nothing but a child. 

They weren’t allowed to return to their homes, see their family, interact with the population in any way that revealed their identities. If they did so, they would be executed privately and efficiently in an offshore military facility so their bodies could be disposed of in the sea. 

Instead, they were given a house in a remote corner of Oregon to live in. It was supposedly their new home now, made of aged wood and refined stone that would make any architect swoon. Two stories of the Seventies to call their own surrounded by acres of trees with a 350 acre lake as a neighbor. It would give them privacy and a sense of calm to be separated from society through nature, they had said. After all, they were allowed to do anything they desired with their time. They could have whatever they desired, without a thought towards the cost of any luxury. The government would pay for all of their needs to express their gratitude for the heroism they displayed in saving the entire universe. 

Everyone involved knew it was a lie that this arrangement would make things alright. 

Which is why, upon reaching their new place of residence, the five former paladins of Voltron cautiously entered the building that was now considered their house. The bedroom on the ground floor was given to Shiro, because one of its walls was made of sliding-glass doors that overlooked the lakefront. The sound of the water was both calming and grounding, and the sight of the lake filled him with a strange sense of ease he couldn’t quite place. The second floor contained three bedrooms as well as a bathroom and communal space. Keith and Lance claimed the room above Shiro’s to ensure that Lance could also benefit from their calming lakeside for he had only ever been able to sleep when the sound of small waves covered all of his senses. The small balcony was a bonus, given that Keith had taken up smoking about halfway through their time in space. Easy access to the calming night air would give him more opportunities to self-medicate through smoke and nicotine. Hunk grabbed the room beside theirs for its window seat facing the forest gave him the space he needed for growing herbs and other cooking supplements. The large windows would give him a perfect view of the rain when it came, for the condensation would cling to the glass and comfort him by wrapping him in its natural air of understanding. Pidge grabbed the small room at the end of the hallway that was situated in the middle of the house, windowless and cozy with a built-in loft bed. It reminded her of the castle and her bedroom back home, and she wouldn’t have to be reminded of the war every time she glanced upwards and a stray tree caught her eye. 

Shiro had tried to gather everyone together after they had claimed their rooms and put away their scarce belongings, but everyone seemed as if they were in a trance as the night began to fall. Pidge was curled under a blanket in her loft, tears silently drifting from her eyes into her mouth as she clutched a small music player in her hand and mouthed along to the words. Hunk had smiled at him, but his eyes betrayed his attempt at light-hearted company. He wasn’t there, not really, as he sat in the window seat and jotted down notes in an old notebook. Keith and Lance were curled into each other on their bed, Keith petting Lance’s hair and whispering reassurances to him in a soothing tone as Lance’s heaving chest accompanied his gut-wrenching sobs. Lance would occasionally claw at his arms in an attempt to distract himself from whatever he was thinking, and Keith would gently hold his wrists until Lance settled back into his previous melancholic state. Shiro would be lying if he said he didn’t notice the tears falling down Keith’s cheeks in their darkened bedroom. 

So he found himself sitting on the corner of his bed, with his head in his hands, rocking back and forth and he fought to keep it together as everyone else was falling apart. It was so overwhelming, to come to the realization that he was back on Earth after six years of imprisonment, war, and enslavement. It didn’t feel real, not in the slightest, but if he let himself sit in that state of mind Shiro wasn’t quite sure if he would ever come back. Instead, he gave up fighting his mind and let his body sink into the overwhelmed state that came with existing. 

Hours later, he realized he was lying on the floor with his prosthetic lodged at an uncomfortable angle under his chest. Shiro picked himself up off of the ground and walked over to his dresser, opening the top drawer and retrieving one of his compression sleeves. He removed his glass eye and placed it in the glass of lukewarm water he had retrieved from the kitchen earlier before unattaching his prosthetic. Placing it on top of the dresser, Shiro pulled the sleeve onto his arm as he shuffled towards his door, closing it softly. Returning to his bed, he found that although he was cold, the blanket from the ship was suffocating him. 

Shiro turned to face the windows, his listless eyes settling on the gently rolling water of the lake before drifting off into the space between consciousness and sleep, his mind prying his memories open once more. The last thing he remembers before falling into the past is the sight of the moon in the sky.

It looks exactly how it does in his memories, even after all these years.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter title taken from: ["in our bedroom after the war" by stars.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZL3vnb0Zubk)

**Author's Note:**

> personal tumblr: [@hidefromeveryone](http://hidefromeveryone.tumblr.com)
> 
> work title taken from: ["in our bedroom after the war" by stars.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZL3vnb0Zubk)
> 
> character tumblrs (send in questions!):  
> keith kogane: [@istudythebladehestudiesthewaves](https://istudythebladehestudiesthewaves.tumblr.com)  
> lance mcclain: [@theemocean](https://theemocean.tumblr.com)  
> pidge gunderson: [@thetreevineswiringmymind](https://thetreevineswiringmymind.tumblr.com)  
> hunk garett: [@mysouffleismadeofdecay](https://mysouffleismadeofdecay.tumblr.com)  
> takashi shirogane: [@wiltingcherryblossoms](https://wiltingcherryblossoms.tumblr.com)
> 
> character playlists (will be added to over time):  
> keith kogane: ["i set fire to the rain"](https://open.spotify.com/user/ironicendings/playlist/70uWmTvorF7N0S88NwPxM8?si=GND_4tEjQhuFHosXSv8Niw)  
> lance mcclain: ["feeling nothing, going nowhere"](https://open.spotify.com/user/ironicendings/playlist/5hIfhzymNfKqSpDHnIOPag?si=p9QLYmV2RTad7ye5LSq74Q)  
> pidge gunderson: ["lately, i've been counting stars"](https://open.spotify.com/user/ironicendings/playlist/1ySGygNVuzhgI4x5kXScVP?si=12p-LhhaTI2tLkUgd6wRjA)  
> hunk garett: ["i'll miss missing you now and again"](https://open.spotify.com/user/ironicendings/playlist/2fWeKMQHaRuM64fGX0m887?si=TjAQ_EcBTcWaF6_RWDYLog)  
> takashi shirogane: ["if death is the last appointent, then we're all just sitting in the waiting room"](https://open.spotify.com/user/ironicendings/playlist/2IXW3rgD3hD5RvMe4qxGl4?si=HAAW-rCCShG2m4TWmnaOVQ)
> 
> comments are the best source of motivation on the planet T_T my aim is to update at least once a week (story-wise) and be active on the other mediums throughout the week!! if you make any sort of fan art, edit, etc. please let me know!! i will love you forever.


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